


Return to Me

by flowerfan



Category: Glee
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-26
Updated: 2014-01-26
Packaged: 2018-01-10 03:34:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,851
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1154317
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flowerfan/pseuds/flowerfan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's been over three months since Blaine was injured, and Kurt still hasn't touched him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Return to Me

Blaine lay on his back in bed, listening to the familiar sounds of Kurt taking a shower and then going through his moisturizing routine, the pop and click of the lotion bottles a rhythm he knew well. Although he adored the apartment he and Kurt had moved into after their wedding last year, there was no denying that it was tiny. “Hobbit-sized,” Santana had called it. His wheelchair barely fit into the kitchen, and Kurt had had to do some creative furniture-rearranging in order to make a path for him through the living room.

It had been over three months since the car accident that had landed Blaine in the hospital and resulted in damage to his spinal cord. Although his injuries probably weren’t permanent, it was going to take a long time and a lot of physical therapy for him to regain full use of his legs. Quinn had surprised them by showing up in the hospital just a few weeks after his surgery to share her story of injury and recovery, and since then continued to call Blaine every few days to discuss how he was doing and listen to his fears. Blaine hoped things would go as smoothly for him as they had for Quinn, but there was no way of knowing yet, he had to simply keep working and try not to get discouraged.

Fortunately, things had been going well with his physical therapy, and his body seemed to be progressing as quickly as his doctors could hope for. After three weeks in the hospital and then a stay in a rehab facility, Blaine had finally come home last month. He was beyond relieved to be back in their little safe space, the haven he and Kurt had created, where they could finally be alone together again. Not everything had been easy, of course, and returning home had if anything placed more of a burden on Kurt. Although they had a home health aide come in for a few hours each day to help Blaine, Kurt was still responsible for the lion’s share of his care, along with the pressures of his job and all of the mundane details of running their lives. Blaine was able to do so much more than he had been just a few weeks ago, and had tried to convince Kurt that he could make dinner and do the laundry just as well from his chair as Kurt could standing up. But Kurt also saw how hard Blaine pushed himself at his therapy sessions, and how tired he got. After the second time Kurt came home from work to find Blaine passed out in his chair in the kitchen, dinner yet to be made, Kurt firmly wrote out a schedule that cut out most of the chores Blaine had been attempting in favor of more rest.

Worse than the guilt that came from seeing Kurt do so much for him was Blaine’s fear that he had nothing to give back in return. Blaine had expected that when he finally came home and was able to be together with Kurt in private, the distance that had slowly grown between them would melt away. But it hadn’t. It was now more than three months since a drunk driver had slammed into the cab Blaine was taking home from a late rehearsal, and Kurt still hadn’t touched him in anything but a friendly manner. Of course, Kurt didn’t hesitate to lift him carefully from his chair to the couch, or help him get ready for bed, patiently assisting while he concentrated on each little movement necessary to just change his pants. And there were encouraging pats on the shoulder, and plenty of quick pecks on the cheek, but nothing more. And Blaine was getting worried. He thought he knew what was behind Kurt’s reticence, but he wasn’t sure. Either way, he was determined to address it tonight. 

Finally Kurt was done with his evening routine. Coming into the room, he glanced quickly at Blaine’s bare chest. “Blaine? Where’s your top? Are you hot, honey?” Kurt lay down and touched the back of his hand to Blaine’s forehead.

“No, no, I’m fine.” And clearly not the kind of hot I was going for, Blaine thought. He was actually pretty proud of how good his chest looked these days – hours and hours of therapy, learning to use his upper body to move the rest of himself around, had left him nicely toned.

“Okay, well let me know if you change your mind. I guess it is a little stuffy in here. Do you want me to get a fan?” Kurt turned to get out of bed, but Blaine reached out for his shoulder to stop him. 

“Don’t worry about that, really. Just, come here.” Blaine took a deep breath. “We need to talk.” Kurt used to tease him about how “we need to talk” always made him fear for the worst, but Blaine didn’t know any other way to say it. His previous hints had gone unnoticed, or at least unheeded, and the time had come to be a little bit more direct.

Kurt obediently turned over to face Blaine, his posture tense. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing. Or, at least, nothing we can’t fix, I think.” Blaine shifted to turn his shoulders towards Kurt, and took Kurt’s hand in both of his. “I love you more than anything. And since my accident you have been the most amazing, supportive, encouraging partner anyone could ever wish for. But I miss you, Kurt. I’m right here next to you, but I’m missing you. And you must miss me too, right?”

Kurt stiffened and looked down at their clasped hands. “I don’t know what you mean,” he said tightly.

“You haven’t touched me since the accident.”

“Of course I’ve touched you,” Kurt began.

“You know that’s not what I mean,” Blaine chided. “And I figure it’s either that you’re not attracted to me anymore, given all this,” he tilted his head towards his legs, “or you’re scared. And I’m really hoping it’s the latter, because the other option scares me even more.” 

“Oh, Blaine,” Kurt breathed, “of course I’m still attracted to you.” Kurt reached up to stroke his hair, curly and gel-free. “My beautiful bushy-haired husband. How could you think otherwise?”

“Because you haven’t shown it,” Blaine said sadly. “And I need you, Kurt. Anyone can help me with the physical stuff – as embarrassing as it is, that home health aide is remarkably good at getting me in and out of the tub without letting me fall and crack my skull open. But I need my husband, and you need me, too, if we’re going to get through this.”

Blaine paused to give Kurt time to respond. He took Kurt’s hand again, gently stroking his thumb back and forth over Kurt’s smooth skin. Finally Kurt looked up at Blaine, his eyes bright and wet. “You’re right. I miss us. But I am scared, Blaine. I’m petrified.” His breath caught as he went on. “I almost lost you. For real. You can’t know how that felt – I hope you never do.” Blaine’s heart broke for Kurt, and he felt his own eyes fill with tears, but he just squeezed Kurt’s hand harder. “You probably don’t even know, but those first few days in the hospital, they weren’t sure if you were going to make it. You were going in and out of consciousness, they didn’t know if you had a brain injury… I just kept praying to whoever is out there in the universe for you to wake up. I didn’t care about anything else, you just had to wake up.” Kurt sniffled and wiped his eyes. “And you did, you woke up and you were still you, and I felt so god damned lucky. Nothing else mattered. I got you back, and I don’t need anything else.”

“But we don’t have to stop there, sweetheart. We can have more, we can have everything we had before.” Blaine tentatively reached up to push Kurt’s hair away from his face, and Kurt closed his eyes, leaning into the touch. “Look, I know you understand that everything still works, you know, south of the border.” This earned a soft chuckle from Kurt. “I will never forget those conversations with Dr. Lee, and I doubt you will either.” Blaine remembered Kurt – blushing bright red - asking the doctor question after question, when Blaine was too frightened to form the words. He had rarely been as grateful for his brave husband as he had been that day.

“But you’re still recovering,” Kurt insisted. “You need to concentrate on getting better, on healing.”

“I’ve talked to my physical therapists. Fooling around isn’t going to hurt me. I promise.” Blaine laughed. “In fact, Bruce suggested it would be good exercise.”

“I can’t believe your PT guy is named Bruce,” Kurt mumbled.

“I think you’re missing the point, Kurt,” Blaine joked. “Come on, will you try something with me?”

Kurt’s eyes widened. “Blaine, I can’t, I don’t know…”

“Relax, not sex. Here, just….” Blaine took Kurt’s hand in his, and held it tightly. “I’ve thought about this a lot. I think it would help if you could get comfortable touching my body again. So you know that physically I’m okay, and how things are working. Will you let me show you?”

Kurt nodded, his lips tight. Blaine figured he might as well press on. He took Kurt’s hand and put it on top of his head, feeling vaguely silly, as if they were going to play “head, shoulders, knees and toes.” Focus, Blaine. “Remember they didn’t find any indication that I hit my head hard enough to do any damage, right? Even after giving me that ridiculous haircut to clean out the scrapes, that’s all there was. Nothing broken there.” Blaine held Kurt’s hand to his head and then let his eyes drift closed for a moment as Kurt tentatively threaded his fingers through Blaine’s hair and let his warm hand rest up against Blaine’s scalp.

He moved Kurt’s hand to the back of his neck. “Top of my spine. All good here. No damage. Just the same as anyone else.” He looked at Kurt for confirmation, and then moved his hand again after Kurt met his eyes, letting Kurt’s hand rest on his shoulder, and then sliding down to his chest. “I’m in good shape here. Some of the exercises they make me do are hard as hell on my upper body, but you can see there’s a nice side effect, right?” Kurt flicked his eyes down to Blaine’s chest, then back up. “You can look at me, baby. I want you to.” Kurt looked at back at where his hand was resting, and Blaine shivered as Kurt ran a finger over his toned pecs. Blaine slid Kurt’s hand over one of his nipples, which reacted to the attention. “See?” He whispered. “Still working.” Blaine could tell Kurt was affected as well, his breathing changing just enough for Blaine to notice.

Blaine then took Kurt’s hand and pulled it around to his lower back, forcing Kurt to move closer to him. Kurt resisted when he realized that Blaine was moving his hand over his healed incision. “It doesn’t hurt, Kurt, I promise. I haven’t seen it, so I don’t know how bad it looks, but I’ve touched it, and I promise it doesn’t hurt anymore, not at all.” Blaine gently moved Kurt’s fingers over the scar, feeling him relax when Blaine didn’t flinch. Blaine didn’t remember much about the surgery, just Kurt sitting by his side when he woke up, stroking his cheek and telling him everything was going to be okay. Now it was his turn to do the reassuring. “I really am all healed up back there. Not just the incision, but my spine is healed too. I mean, it probably wouldn’t be helpful if someone stepped on me, but you can touch me there, even, you know, press. It’s not going to hurt anything.” Blaine could almost feel how often Kurt had placed his hand right there, pulling them closer as they ground their hips together, before letting his fingers slip lower. “Go ahead,” Blaine encouraged. Kurt slowly spread his hand against Blaine’s back, and gently pressed, bringing their bodies just slightly closer together. Blaine softly rubbed his nose against Kurt’s, loving the feel of his husband’s breath against his face, closer and more intimate than they had been in months. “You okay?”

“Yeah,” Kurt said, nodding. “I’m good.” He paused, biting his lip. “Keep going?”

Blaine took Kurt’s hand and moved it around to his hip, sliding his sleep pants down a little as he did. Kurt’s arm tensed, and Blaine thought he might stop him. “It’s okay, Kurt.” Blaine tried to catch his eye, but Kurt was now staring down at their hands. “I’m still good here,” he said, moving Kurt’s hand around to his stomach. “The muscles in my abdomen weren’t involved, and they control a lot of movement in this area. Plus,” Blaine swallowed and moved Kurt’s hand around to his butt, “I’m good here too.” Blaine tried to put Kurt’s hand where he could feel his butt muscles clenching and moving. “You can feel it, right?” Blaine led Kurt’s hand down to his upper thigh. “And major accomplishments are going on here. I’m working really hard on my legs, they’re still not great most of the time, pretty stiff some days, but it keeps getting better.” Blaine ran Kurt’s hand further down his leg, as far as he could reach. “And having you touch me feels good, really good, even if I’m not at my most graceful.”

Blaine brought Kurt’s hand back up and held it up between their chests, feeling Kurt’s heart beat underneath the back of his hand. 

“Just like the song,” Kurt murmured. “My god, Blaine, I am so freaking proud to be with you.”

“What?” Blaine asked, confused. He remembered that day after their West Side Story performance, of course, but didn’t see the connection.

“How did you know?” Kurt asked. Blaine felt Kurt’s feet move to intertwine with his, one foot shoving itself under Blaine’s heavy calf, the easy physical connection between them springing to life. “How did you know what to do to fix us?”

“I didn’t,” Blaine confessed. “But I was scared, so I figured you must be too. And I was afraid that if we let it go on… I just missed you so much.”

“I’m sorry I made you feel scared. I didn’t mean to.”

“I know, Kurt, you don’t have to apologize. You’ve been working like crazy to help me. This isn’t easy.”

“Loving you is always easy.” Kurt smiled and raised their joined hands to his mouth, kissing Blaine’s knuckles. “But I hadn’t even realized what I was doing to you, keeping away from you that way. I should have talked to you about it. I’m so glad you spoke up.” Kurt sighed. “We haven’t been this bad at communicating since high school. I guess this wasn’t something we expected to have to deal with.”

“Nobody expects the Spanish inquisition,” Blaine joked, covering his face as Kurt swatted at him.

“I can’t believe you said that in the middle of our heartfelt conversation,” Kurt moaned. 

“Kurt,” Blaine sighed happily, nuzzling his face into Kurt’s neck. “We’re back, right? We’re okay?”

“We were never not going to be okay,” Kurt reassured him, stroking his hands through Blaine’s hair, and then gently around to his shoulder. “I love you so much, you know that, right?”

“I do. I love you too.”

“I know.” Blaine melted into Kurt as he traced circles on his upper back. Being back in Kurt’s arms was heavenly.

Blaine couldn’t believe the change in Kurt - and in himself – in the days that followed. Both of them were noticeably relieved and delighted to be able to resume the casual, loving touches that were such a foundation of their relationship. The mood around the apartment changed dramatically: Kurt no longer felt obligated to put on such a brave front, and let Blaine soothe him when he got tense. They spent several evenings making out on the couch like teenagers, and fell asleep wrapped around each other every night. Kurt was still skittish about going further, however, and so after about a week Blaine decided to fall back on a tried and true approach, one that he reserved for times when puppy eyes weren’t enough.

That night, as they lay in bed together, trading gentle kisses, Blaine pulled back and cleared his throat to get Kurt’s attention.

“Kurt? There’s something I need to ask you,” he said lightly, not wanting to ruin the mood.

“Oh? What’s that?”

“Kurt Hummel, my amazing friend, my one true love, will you make love to me tonight?” Blaine could feel his grin stretch across his face as he tried not to laugh.

Kurt giggled, and then gave the answer both boys knew had to follow. “Yeah,” he said, diving in to kiss Blaine. “Yeah.”

**Author's Note:**

> This is just something that was stuck in my head and I had to see where it went. Please comment! I would love to hear from you.


End file.
